Culture Takes A Back Seat In Cubans' Name Choices: Meet My Son, Usmail

July 24, 2004|By Diana Marrero Miami Bureau

Mayco VillafaM-qa insists his mother was not a bad speller when he was born.

VillafaM-qa, 53, says his Cuban mother intended to use an unconventional spelling of the Anglo name Michael. Still, he admits his name has caused problems.

"I always had to correct people that my name wasn't Mako, like a shark," said VillafaM-qa, who is among scores of Cuban immigrants who have imported more than their language and cafM-i Cubano to Miami.

Not content with a simple Maria or Jose, Cuban parents have become masters of creative naming -- often with comical results.

Decades after the Cuban revolution practically closed off the island to the rest of the world, traditional Spanish names have given way to one-of-a-kind monikers. Like their brothers and sisters on the island, Cubans here answer to names like Misleidy, Yoleysi, Yulaikis, Yusimi, Reyner, Deandy and Duniel.

School children have amused their teachers with names like Usnavy, derived from U.S. Navy, and Usmail, from U.S. Mail.

Others, like Anaisy Rodriguez and her sister, Anaivis, have names that tangle American tongues.

"Some people call me Annie," says Anaisy, 16.

In some high-profile examples, the Miami cousin of Cuban castaway EliM-an GonzM-alez is memorably known as Marisleysis; the mayor of Hialeah Gardens is a Cuban-American named Yioset De La Cruz.

Recent arrivals are among those with the most unusual names.

"It's a rejection of Hispanic culture and a fascination for the foreign, for what's different," said Carlos Paz Perez, who compiled a dictionary of popular Cuban slang and speech. "It also had a political connotation. Very few people in Cuba are calling their children Maria Luisa."

Paz Perez, a former linguistics professor on the island who now works with Cuban refugees in Miami, said he has come across a number of eccentric names in his new line of work.

One man was named Yotuel, Spanish for me, you, him. Someone else was named Yumani, possibly from the word Yuma, Cuban slang for the United States.

Damian Fernandez, director of the Cuban Research Institute at Florida International University, said the onslaught of uncommon names in Cuba is a reflection of the social dynamics on the island.

"It's an interesting way of taking the pulse of social change by the names that people use," he said. "Names have traditions and legacies associated with them, and the revolution attempted to break with the past."

Before the collapse of the Soviet Union in 1991, Russian names like Vladimir, Natacha and Sergei were in vogue on the communist island.

Rylma Naranjo said her parents wanted to name her younger brother Rey -- king in Spanish -- when he was born just four years after the 1959 Cuban revolution. But the Cuban government would not allow it.

"They told them there were no kings in Cuba," she said. Her parents had to settle for the more common Reynaldo.

Naranjo's own name, however, had no political implications. Her parents, Rodolfo and Ysabel, used the first letter in each of their first names to come up with Rylma.

Janisset Rivero's name was inspired by the black-licorice-flavored liqueur, anisette.

She likes her name plenty, she said. But when it came time to name her daughter, Gabriela, she stuck to convention.

"No strange names," she chuckled.

Yanet Obarrio-Sanchez, who works at a public relations firm in Coral Gables, can't help but laugh when she thinks of all the people in her family whose name starts with a Y.

Her husband's name is Yazit, her little cousins are Yenesi and Yesenia.

She can't explain the fascination Cubans have with the letter but shrugs it off as an idiosyncrasy.

That's the way George Jorge explains his name.

"All the men in my family have English first names," said Jorge, whose father was named Everett and his grandfather was Joseph.

Why his parents would name him George Jorge, though, evades him.

Diana Marrero can be reached at dmarrero@sun-sentinel.com or 305-810-5005.